Haunting and Scares Collection

by Rosemary Cullen

  The scratching noise intensified.

  “What the hell?” Stephanie said, now realizing it wasn’t coming from above. “This is crazy. It’s too early for all this.”

  Stephanie turned around and darted for the door so she could step out into the hallway and see about finding what the scratching noise could be. Just as she’d swung her door open, light from her bedroom reached out into the hallway. There Scout was, tongue hanging out of his mouth and eyes very attentive, standing in the hallway. Stephanie had opened the door just as the dog was lifting his paw to scratch against the wall yet again.

  “Scout?” Stephanie said. She rubbed her face, remembering how she and her children had spent quite some time last night looking for the missing dog. “It was you making that noise.”

  Stephanie peered down the hallway, figuring one of her children must have gotten up earlier than usual. Whoever it was must’ve opened the front door to see if Scout returned and found him waiting on the front porch. Too tired to go have a talk about opening the front door, she reached down and petted Scout and then returned to her bed with the hopes of getting just one more hour of sleep before getting her day started.

  “Come on, Scout,” Stephanie said, motioning for the dog to jump on her bed. She was still a bit surprised that the missing dog returned, but it was too early to ask too many questions. The groggy woman, now enjoying the return of early morning silence, climbed back into her bed and dozed back off to sleep.

  Seconds seemed to pass by before Stephanie opened her eyes again. This time, though, the sun had risen over the hills much more than before. Birds chirped; the morning haze was wearing off, giving away to a clearer view of Moorestown. Again, Stephanie grabbed her phone. “Gotta get up now, Stephanie,” she said to herself, seeing the hour had passed in the blink of an eye. “Time to go be Mom.”

  Stephanie lugged her legs out of the bed and headed downstairs. Scout followed anxiously, as if ready to have some breakfast himself. As Stephanie turned at the landing in the foyer, she looked down at the dog and chuckled, shaking her head. Not soon after getting started with breakfast, she heard thumping upstairs. She finished cooking and put the food on the dining room table.

  “Hey, kids! Breakfast is ready, so chop chop! Hurry up to see your surprise!”

  “Surprise?” yelled Jane.

  “Yes, ma’am. A big one. Hustle your brothers up and get on down here.”

  She heard them clomping down the stairs and then they stopped when they got to the kitchen doorway. At that point they pushed and shoved each other to get to Scout.

  “Careful. There’s room for all of you to get in to pet him.”

  “I knew you’d come back, Scout!” Jonathan exclaimed.

  “Where did you go, buddy?” Jane asked.

  “I told you guys he’d be back,” Stephanie said. “He probably went a couple of blocks over and was playing with some other dogs or something and we just didn’t see him.”

  Timothy petted the dog before sitting down to enjoy his breakfast.

  “Go ahead and get to the table. Breakfast first and then you can play with Scout.”

  The kids scattered from the dog to their places at the table. “What are we doing today?” asked Jane as she pulled out her chair and plopped in it.

  “You’re spending the day with Grandma and Grandpa. I have no idea what is planned. Grandpa may make you work in his garden pulling weeds or picking okra, squash, and tomatoes.”

  “Aww, he won’t do that.” Timothy looked glumly into his bowl of oatmeal.

  “I want to do something fun!” Jonathan declared pushing his chair back and standing with his hands on his hips.

  “Well, whatever you all do, remember they’re not as young as they used to be. Go easy on them, kids.”

  Finally finished with breakfast and dressed for a day that had potential to be filled with fun, they piled into the car and drove to Eloise and Judd’s house.

  Eloise was waiting out in the front yard when Stephanie pulled up. She pulled into the driveway, allowing the kids to run up, hug Grandma, and then disappear into the house. By this time, her father, dressed in his iconic sky blue robe, walked out with his morning coffee and newspaper. Stephanie chuckled under her breath, tapped her mother on the shoulder, and pointed toward the porch. Her father had just plopped down in a chair and opened his newspaper with his legs stretched out in front of him.

  “So, I see Dad thinks the kids are going to let him have a relaxing morning.”

  Eloise giggled and shook her head as she turned back around. “Yeah, he used to do that when you all were kids. Left me doing all the work. I’m older now, honey. And smarter. We’ll see how long this lasts.”

  The mother and daughter laughed before going their separate ways, Stephanie returning to her car and Eloise heading up onto the porch. Just as Stephanie had backed out into the street, she saw her father jump up, drop his newspaper, set his coffee mug down, and rush inside. She laughed and shook her head, wondering what their precious grandchildren had gotten into.

  On the short drive back across town, Stephanie’s mind raced with everything she needed to do while she had the time to herself. First and foremost, she wanted to use today to get some serious cleaning done. And fall was quickly approaching and she knew there were certain renovations she planned to have finished before the temperatures started to drop, not that the drop would be anything in comparison to the weather in Chicago.

  She made a mental list of what she wanted to clean upon arriving back at her house, and she was determined to use the peace and quiet and time away from the kids to get it all done. She already knew when she finished, she wanted to get more serious about looking for a nursing job, which was something she’d gone to sleep thinking about. By the time fall gets here, Stephanie thought, I should have found a job and the house will be in good shape.

  When Stephanie stepped into her foyer and shut the door, she stood there for a couple of seconds longer than usual. She looked up at the banister and the walls; she peered into the living room and down the hall leading under the staircase and back to the kitchen. “So much to do,” she muttered to herself. “So much to do. Why did I choose this house?”

  Stephanie considered the best place to start, then as she walked into the kitchen to put the kids’ plates in the sink, she decided the basement would probably be best. Doing anything in the basement had sort of been the last place she’d though important, but now it seemed like maybe the space down there might come in handy. And today she wanted to see something new. She’d done enough work out in the new garden, even though there was much more there to do. The den was as good as it was going to get for the moment. The kids’ bedrooms were already such a mess that she should probably just ignore them until she was ready to paint them.

  So, with her mind made up, Stephanie approached the basement door, which was between the kitchen and the den. She opened it and looked down the dark steps before flipping on the light and heading down.

  “Okay,” Stephanie said upon getting to the bottom. “This isn’t so bad. Not so scary. For a lair.” She’d looked into the basement a couple of times since moving into the house, but it had been relatively off her radar. The longer she stood in the cold basement, though, the more exposed she felt.

  Something about being there, already alone in the house where so many strange things had been happening, just didn’t sit well with her. Any little noise startled her; any dark crevice seemed pitch black. Stephanie walked through the few rooms, seeing the previous owners had left some things, and decided she was going to clean it all out on her own without her kids’ help. Furthermore, the house had been empty for a while, leaving cobwebs in various corners.

  “I’ll get those nasty things, too,” she said to herself. “No problem. Then I’ll spray down here.”

  Alone in the basement, Stephanie pushed old boxes and lamps toward the steps. There were just a couple of things she might need help carrying up the stairs, but a majority of the ab
andoned items were light enough for her to carry on her own. Once she’d finished with the first room, she entered a smaller room off to the side and flipped on the light. There, she found a nice-sized wooden table—a table she surely could use if she were to paint it and make it look better. Grabbing one edge, she pulled the table toward the stairs then got on to moving other items, stacking them on the table.

  As Stephanie made her way across the room, moving things toward the doorway so she could take them up the steps, she found a large rolled-up rug. It had been somewhat hidden in the dimly-lit room, in a corner behind boxes of dishes. The woman stood there for a moment, taking in the rug’s sophisticated design.

  “This looks like one expensive rug,” Stephanie commented to herself, thinking that she’d finally found something of value in this big, old house. With her curiosity piqued, Stephanie grabbed one side of the roll and pulled the rug away from the dim corner and then started to unroll it so she could see just how beautiful it was. Of course, it very well could be in bad shape from being in a damp basement for only God knew how long.

  With a single push, the rug flipped open, and Stephanie jumped back. She gasped, covering her mouth with her hand. The last thing in the world she ever expected to see was a huge dense brown stain across the middle.

  “No,” she said, looking around as if someone were going to come out with an explanation. “Is that?” Stephanie couldn’t even utter the word blood, she’d been so taken aback.

  “It does look like blood, but certainly it’s something else.”

  Frozen in place, Stephanie tried to reason with herself and say the reddish-brown stain couldn’t be blood. However, she had been a mother and a nurse long enough to know what a bloodstain looked like.

  “I wonder what happened. It’s a lot of blood, that’s for sure.”

  Someone had been injured badly on the rug, but why had the owner—whichever owner along the way in the house’s long history—kept it? Had they been reluctant to throw it away because it was obviously an extravagant rug and probably cost a pretty penny? Perhaps they were just lazy.

  A brief wave of disappointment came over Stephanie, as she now realized this beautiful rug wasn’t one she could unroll and have in her foyer or living room. Still, she was hesitant to throw it away because it looked so very expensive. She rolled the rug back up and leaned it against the wall, telling herself she’d come back to it later once she’d given some thought as to what she’d do with it.

  After spending another couple of hours clearing the basement out, making trips to the pile of trash with boxes and whatnot, Stephanie grabbed her car keys and headed back over to her parents’ house to pick up the kids. All the while, as she made her way across Moorestown, she wondered what in the world could’ve happened to the lovely rug she’d found in the basement. How could a person have gotten that much blood onto the rug and survived?

  Chapter 6

  That afternoon, the temperature rose to a balmy ninety degrees. With the pleasant weather, came a wind that was reminiscent of what whipped in off of Lake Michigan in Chicago. Stephanie had been getting something out of the car when a strong, hot breeze whisked up the street. The setting sun, now sliding out of the sky on the other side of Moorestown, cast purple and orange hues across the sky and cooled the hot landscape slightly.

  The last of the light illuminated the steeples and tops of houses in the distance. Stephanie closed her eyes for a moment to enjoy the sensation then headed back up to the house, deciding that she’d open the windows and enjoy a good book at her favorite place in the dining room.

  The sun continued its descent from the sky as Stephanie sat at the dining room table. At first, she struggled to focus and get into the book. However, as the evening approached and the sounds of crickets and other insects replaced that of chirping birds, the woman found a strange pleasure in reading—a relaxing pleasure she hadn’t felt in quite some time. The children were playing games upstairs in their rooms, surely with Scout right in the middle of things. Just as Stephanie flipped the page, something flashed out of the corner of her eye in the window.

  What was that? Quickly, she set the book down on the table, stood up, and parted the curtains. She was greeted with nothing but darkness, but that wasn’t enough to calm her nerves. She paused for a moment, trying to justify that perhaps she’d been seeing something that wasn’t really there. The way her heart was thumping, Stephanie knew very well she’d seen something. What that something was, she had no idea, but she wasn’t done looking.

  Stephanie rushed out of the dining room and into the kitchen. There, she stepped up to the back door. She flipped on the back porch light and quickly pulled the door open. A frightened gasp slipped from her lips as she quickly slammed the door and parted the curtains to look out. The sound of footsteps, running away, shook her to her core.

  The silhouette of a person, running away into the darkness, petrified her. It was very clear that whoever had been running away as she opened her door had been looking into her window. Stephanie felt like she was going to pass out, but she was unable to move.

  After making sure the back door was locked, Stephanie rushed back into the dining room to get her phone. Her intentions were to call the police, but she paused after picking up her phone. What would she tell them? That someone, supposedly, had been looking into her window? She hadn’t even gotten a good look at the guy—if it even was a guy.

  The person hadn’t knocked or tried to get in. As far as she could tell, there was no damage to her property. Rubbing her forehead in anguish, Stephanie decided against calling the police. Instead, she set her phone back down on the table.

  The uneasy feeling had ruined Stephanie’s evening, but she went ahead and tried her best to get back into her book. Nonetheless, a few minutes couldn’t pass without her getting up to look out of the window. Just as she’d been sitting down for the umpteenth time, Timothy came walking in from the living room. The boy paused and looked at his mother, realizing she was nervous, if not outright frightened.

  “Mom, are you okay?” Timothy asked.

  Stephanie simply set her book down, deciding that her peaceful night of reading was over. “Yeah, Timothy,” she said, forcing a smile. “I’m okay… I guess.” She leaned back and looked out of the window yet again. “I’m fine, I’m fine. Why do you ask that?”

  Timothy stared down at the floor for a moment before speaking. “Well,” the boy said, hesitantly, “Mom, I didn’t want to say anything, but I’m worried.”

  “Worried about what?” Stephanie asked, standing up. Timothy had always been so brave for a little boy that she couldn’t imagine what would be worrying him.

  “My phone keeps ringing,” Timothy finally responded. “And when I answer, there’s nobody there. And...”

  “Do you recognize the number? Is it maybe one of your friends from Chicago?”

  “It comes up as a blocked number. None of my friends would do that. It’s lame.”

  “Okay, well, next time it happens bring it to me. I’ll see what happens when I answer.”

  Timothy looked skeptical, but nodded. “Okay, I will.”

  While the phone situation seemed like maybe it was related to his friends, Stephanie’s maternal apprehension grew as she saw her little boy was clearly worried, if not fearful, about something else.

  “What else, Timothy?”

  “Well,” Timothy began, “I didn’t want to say anything, but last night, I saw someone at the window. Or, at least, I think I did.”

  Stephanie’s eyes bulged as she rushed around the table and approached her son. “Huh?” she asked, glancing back at the dining room window. “You saw somebody looking in the window? Why didn’t you say anything, Timothy? Because...” She trailed off, realizing maybe she shouldn’t mention what had just happened only minutes earlier.

  “Cause, Mom,” Timothy said. “I didn’t want to worry you. And I thought I might have just been seeing things. I don’t know who would be looking into the window. Neve
r mind, it was probably nothing. I don’t know, though. I really think I saw someone looking in the window last night.”

  Stephanie opened her mouth to speak but had nothing to say. She stroked her son’s hair as a heart-sinking fear set into her soul. Soon enough, let him go and looked up and around the house. The newness of the new place and the excited feeling she’d felt upon walking through the door had corroded. Something about this house was unsettling.

  Too many odd things had been occurring since they’d moved in, and there was no other way to look at it. In the flash of a second, her mind went back over each and every strange occurrence since finding their suitcases moved all the way to the other side of the foyer.

  Once Stephanie finally snapped out of her daze, she looked into Timothy’s eyes. He looked scared and brave at the same time.

  “Okay,” she finally said. “Thanks for telling me, Timothy. We’ll just have to keep a closer eye out, in case it was someone looking in the window. I don’t remember how long this house was empty before we got here, but it very well could’ve been someone looking inside. You know how people are with big old houses... the curiosity, and all.”

  Timothy shrugged his shoulders. He then dropped the subject and, somberly, headed back toward the staircase. When Stephanie heard her son’s footsteps heading up the stairs, she turned around and shook her head as she leaned against the chair in thought. Several seconds later, she looked at the dining room table and recalled the glances her mother and father had thrown at one another. She now wondered, even more than ever before, why the couple had looked at one another in such a way.

  A deep sense of regret was now settling into Stephanie’s mind. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, she wished she would’ve listened to her mother when she said that this house was too much. At this moment, she desperately wished she would’ve never bought this house.